


don't you know? all the fairytales are true

by lizziebobizzy



Category: Lunar Chronicles - Marissa Meyer
Genre: F/M, how small is this fandom..., there are like no tags here...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-21
Updated: 2015-01-06
Packaged: 2018-03-02 17:50:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2820932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lizziebobizzy/pseuds/lizziebobizzy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Collection of stories based on tlcshipweeks prompt. Multiple pairings.</p><p>01: (jacin/winter, daybreak) Jacin has no value for beauty. He knows better. (There’s a girl, a girl with dark hair and bright eyes, and when he thinks of her, that girl in his memory calls him liar with a dazzling grin that makes his heart stop.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The sun hits the edge of the horizon. A more artistic person than he might find a dozen ways to describe the beauty in the light, the color or the feelings such a picturesque scene might evoke.

But not he.

Jacin has no value for beauty. He knows better.

(There’s a girl, a girl with dark hair and bright eyes, and when he thinks of her, that girl in his memory calls him _liar_ with a dazzling grin that makes his heart stop, but he can’t think of her or else—or else—anyway. He just doesn’t.)

Jacin knows best, of course, that the things most beautiful are often also the most useless. It’s self-preservation; he’s a prime example. After all people can’t help but want to possess beautiful things until they violate them, violate them until they become an empty void, not even human—until—Jacin stops himself. Excessive emotion is unwise in the midst of those who can sense bioelectricity.

(It’s why he tries not to think of the girl as best he can—no one brings out excessive emotion in him like she does.)

Instead he finishes out his daily workout regimen— _98…99… 100_ pull ups. Sweat trickles off his brow into his eyes, the salt stinging him and the moisture blurring his vision until the yellow, pink, orange of the sun blurs together.

Its brightness reminds him painfully of his princess.

Jacin turns away from the window and begins his push ups.

\---

Winter _loves_ sunrises. She imagines what it’s like, so far up in the sky, free from the thick blanket of blood that hangs down on her shoulders, and she thinks that must be what freedom is. Winter holds her hands out through the window, right on top of the sun. She stretches a little further and catches the sun in her hands and brings it carefully to her chest, like she would an injured sparrow.

“La la,” she says happily to herself. “It’s my very own sun. Do you know who you remind me of, Mr. Sun?” she asks.

No one replies.

She thinks of the man whose smile is the rising sun, and her heart twists. Her poor, poor hunter, so stoic and cynical on the outside, but only because he had to be. (When the headaches plague her head, when she leans her cheek against the toilet seat after an onset of nausea, when she reaches out to touch something only to find out it’s not real, when her body _thrums_ at all the bioelectricity around her, just begging to be played with—Winter thinks of her hunter and her will to _never_ use her power strengthens.)

There’s a throbbing pain at the base of her skull, and she knows what this means, that another one of those visions that are never real is coming, and she desperately, desperately hopes for a vision of her hunter, but it’s never him, and she swipes at her hallucination, which disintegrates into nothingness. It’s never him. She’s seen her father, her mother, even that cyborg princess, but she never ever seen the one she wants to see the most. Even if it’s not real, she wants to see his gold hair, bright as snow reflecting the sunlight in at noon, and his eyes like moonrock.

Jacin. Jacin. Jacin.

With great reluctance, she releases the sun from her hands and into the sky. It was never hers to hold anyway.


	2. Genderbend (Kai/Cinder)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Come to the ball with me." Kai's voice rang clear and high over the crowd watching them. Kai held her head up high regally, but only Cinder could see the wavering confidence in her eyes, and he wanted to do a million things. Cinder wanted to throttle the empress for purposely putting him in this position in front of so many witnesses. He also wanted to kiss that doubt right off the empresses's face.
> 
> But Cinder couldn't do any of those things.

Cinder: ♂

Kai: ♀

 

_Cinder has just fixed and returned Nainsi to Kai, having removed the D-COMM interrupting Nainsi’s power. Cinder is explaining to Kai what the D-COMM looked like._

Cinder pinched his fingers together, concentrating fiercely, his brow furrowing. “The chip was about this big, square-ish, like a normal chip but…shimmery. Like tiny gemstones. Pearlescent kind of.”

Kai groaned and tilted her head back. Cinder swallowed at the long expanse of her neck. “It’s Lunar,” Kai said with confidence and frustration. Her normally high voice was low with anger.

“What? Are you sure?” Cinder asked dumbly.

“Yes…we don’t know what it is, but whatever it is, it’s one of their biggest natural resources. They use it everywhere,” Kai said grimly.

“Elevator B for Her Imperial Highness,” said the android as they walked into the elevator together. Cinder furrowed his brow, glancing at the security camera hanging from the roof of the elevator out of the corner of his eyes. Who knew where else the Lunar had burrowed their claws into? It meant Kai wasn’t safe, not even within the heavily armed palace. Cinder clenched his jaw. It was up to him to protect the foolhardy Empress Kai, it seemed.

“I _hate_ her,” Kai said angrily.

“Is that safe?” Cinder said gravely, waiting for Kai to meet his eyes, then flicking his own towards the security camera.

Kai caught his meaning immediately. “I don’t _care_. I do, and she knows it. I’m so sick of her overpowering me no matter what I do, just because I’m human, just because I’m a girl.” Kai burrowed her head in her hands and shuddered.

Cinder froze. He had been alive for sixteen years with little to no contact with women, and never with one as gorgeous, maddening, complex, and _good_ like Kai. She always seemed so strong that Cinder was absolutely at loss what to do with Kai crying.

Cinder lifted one large, gloved hand, and gently removed Kai’s hands from her face. All he knew was that he wanted to see Kai’s face. So he tilted her chin up and brushed away a lone tear with his index finger. Kai shivered at the texture of Cinder’s soft gloves and bit her lip.

Cinder focused on that one movement.

“Do you ever take these off?” Kai asked softly, bringing up one hand to press his gloved hand onto her cheek.

Cinder’s heart started beating a mile an hour, it seemed, although no warning diagnostic popped up telling her of an increased heart rate. “No,” he said stiffly, wanting to jerk back her hand, but aware that it would look suspicious if he did so.

“I think you should go to the ball with me.”

Cinder’s heart dropped to his stomach. Kai looked too much like a cat who got the cream, with her sly smile. It was an attractive look, the confident look of a woman who was used to getting what she wanted.

Honestly, Cinder wasn’t sure if he was strong enough to be the first person to resist that smile. “Stars,” he muttered. “Didn’t you already ask me that?”

Kai’s sly smile grew wider. “I’m hoping for a more favorable answer this time. I’m not used to hearing no,” she said ruefully.

“How charming.”

“Please?” Kai pouted and Cinder gulped.

“Why?”

“Why not?”

“I mean, why me?”

Kai shoved her hands into the pockets of her dress, an action that Cinder found oddly endearing. “So if my escape hover breaks down, I’ll have someone on hand to fix it?” She smiled shyly.

Cinder rolled his eyes, but found himself mute and unable to look away from Kai’s honest grin. His hand had long dropped from Kai’s face, but the two still stood close together, and Kai seemed to notice their proximity as soon as Cinder did.

“There are about 200,000 single boys in the city who would fall over themselves to go with you,” he joked, trying to cut the tensions.

“Cinder,” Kai said softly. “200,000 single girls. But not you?” Kai tried to hide the worry in her eyes, and the hurt in her heart. _Did I misread the signals?_ Kai thought. _I didn’t think he liked me as much as I did him, but…I thought he liked me at least a little._

Cinder saw Kai’s wince and felt a responding pit in her stomach. He didn’t want to hurt the empress. But how to explain that the problem laid with him, not her, without sounding like a douche? “I’m sorry. But trust me – you don’t want to go with me.”

The elevator doors opened, and Cinder felt the relief hit him. No more having to decline Kai when that was actually the last thing in the world she wanted to do. She stepped out of the elevator, hoping the people waiting outside wouldn’t gossip about her and the empress being alone together in the elevator.

“Come to the ball with me.” Kai’s clear, high voice rang out over the crowd. She lifted her head confidently, in that regal way of hers that no one could refuse.

Only Cinder could see the wavering confidence in her eyes, and Cinder wanted to do a million things. He wanted to throttle Kai, for purposely putting him in this spot, in front of so many witnesses. He also wanted to back Kai into the elevator, and close the door so they could be alone, then kiss the uncertainty right off her face.

Only Cinder couldn’t do any of those thing, because he was Lunar and a mechanic, and cyborg to boot. “I can’t,” he said, mortified. “I’m sorry,” he said meaningfully, looking into Kai’s eyes, hoping she would understand.

Then he fled.


End file.
